The field of the disclosure relates generally to traffic management systems. More specifically, the disclosure relates to a traffic management system that collects information using a network.
Currently, various types of information service providers (ISPs) provide traffic information to users. The various types of ISPs include traffic and map systems such as Westwood One, Traffic.com/Navteq, Clear Channel Traffic; portal systems such as Yahoo!, Google, MapQuest/AOL, MicroSoft MSN; wireless carriers such as Verizon Wireless, Cingular Wireless, Sprint Nextel, T-Mobile; telematics and navigation systems—GM OnStar, Ford, Toyota, XM Satellite Radio, Sirius Satellite Radio, Garmin, TomTom, Magellen, Motorola, AAA; and media companies such as NBC, ABC, CBS, etc. With the improvement in the quality and the granularity of traffic and travel time information, ISPs attempt to provide route-specific travel time information and dynamic route guidance information to individual users to influence the individual's travel choices including departure time, arrival time, route, destination, etc. An individual traveler relies on the ISP's information and personal experiences and preferences to make individual decisions for their travel choices.
As ISPs provide route-specific travel time information and dynamic route guidance information to more and more individual users, market penetration of actionable traffic information services may increase rapidly. As this type of actionable traffic information provision market penetration reaches a critical threshold, users with similar traffic and travel time information may compete for the shortest travel time routes creating new congestion for these routes. For example, users in the San Francisco Bay Area typically choose US 101 to travel from San Francisco to San Jose. When severe congestion occurs on US 101, for example, due to a major traffic accident, many ISPs advise motorists to use alternate routes I-280 or El Camino Real to avoid major congestion on US 101. However, with the diversion of a large number of users from US 101 to I-280 or El Camino Real these routes quickly become congested.
In order to populate these systems, large amounts of traffic data need to be collected. The traffic and travel time information can also be used for traffic studies, for monitoring traffic flow, or for detecting accidents. However, it is expensive to collect the traffic information. Traffic information is typically collected by closed-circuit video cameras, observers or by axle counters. Video cameras can be used by employees to determine general traffic flow and detect problems like accidents. However, closed-circuit video systems are expensive to maintain and operate. Observer based studies are comprehensive but expensive to conduct over long periods. Axle counters can be deployed for long periods, but the counters must be collected for processing, Moreover, using current detection methods, travel times are inferred from speed detections which themselves are often derived from vehicle counts, yielding errors of up to 35-40%. Thus, improved systems and methods for collecting traffic data are needed.